The Tractive 3G Pet Tracker can help you find a pet on the loose, but its GPS-only approach proves somewhat limiting.

Some pet trackers focus on activity, others on location, and some do both. Austria-based Tractive has offered the activity-tracking Motion for some time, while its $69.99 GPS 3G Pet Tracker is relatively new to the US. Unlike the fitness-focused Motion, it's geared specifically toward location. You can track it using your phone or via the web, and it works on dogs, cats, or basically any other creature over nine pounds. But the lack of activity tracking makes it less attractive to owners concerned about their pet's health, and its location tracking isn't as strong as our Editors' Choice, the Whistle 3, which tracks both location and activity.

Pricing

Activity-only trackers like the Tractive Motion have a one-time cost. But location trackers require you to pay for 3G data service that typically incurs monthly or yearly fees. With Tractive, you have a choice of either basic or premium service in the US. Basic includes only tracking with 24 hours of positioning info; it costs $6.99 per month or $119.99 upfront for two years (that's $5 a month). Premium service includes GPS tracker sharing, the ability to use the tracker in different countries (up to 80), unlimited positioning history and exports, and more. It costs $9.99 a month, $124.99 for two years (that equals $5.21 per month), or $74.99 for one year (that's $6.25 a month). The two-year premium plan is the best deal by far.

The cheapest price you can get for a two-year period with Tractive's premium plan and the device itself is $194.98. That compares favorably with our top-rated tracker, the Whistle 3, which costs $246.75 for two years, or the Link AKC, which is $345.80. However, the similarly equipped Nuzzle tracker has a one-time fee of $189.99 for life, making it the most economical choice. And keep in mind all of those competitors include activity tracking.

Tractive's US-based GPS positioning is provided by AT&T and T-Mobile, depending on where you are. There's no Bluetooth, even for setup, nor is there Wi-Fi. If you have poor service from the carriers in your area, you have 14 days to return the tracker for a full refund.

Design and Features

Inside the box along with the device is a manual, two plastic clips to attach it to a collar, a clamp-on USB charging cable, and a multi-country charger block to plug into the wall. The Tractive device itself is a shiny, black, rounded rectangle measuring 1.61 by 2.01 by 0.59 inches (HWD) and weighing 1.23 ounces. It's not too obtrusive on a collar. It has a logo printed on it, with a push button to turn the device on and off, plus a tiny LED used to indicate various settings (red for low battery, white flashes while in live tracking, green for when cellular and/or GPS networks are available, and more).

On the back is a sticker with a QR code for activation, and four little metal contacts. You have to clamp the charger onto those contacts just right to charge the device, which is cumbersome. On the plus side, the fully sealed design earns an IPX7 rating, making it fully waterproof for up to 1 meter of water for 30 minutes.

The clips for the Tractive are arguably the least robust attachments I've seen on any dog tracker, just simple plastic arches that clip into recesses at each end. The ease of detachment by pulling up on the tabbed end makes it look like a trip through the underbrush by an adventurous pup will leave the tracker in the dust. Unlike other devices like the FitBark, Paby, and Whistle 3—all of which use a rugged elastic band for collar attachment—you don't have the option to even retrofit a band on the Tractive.

Should you lose the two included plastic clips, Tractive will sell you another set of two for $10. It also offers a $1 per month replacement plan in case your pup loses the tracker in the woods.

App and Performance

To get started, set up a profile for yourself in the Tractive GPS app available for Android, iOS, and (surprise) Windows Phone. There is also a web-based interface available. The web version offers all the basic services like creating a safe zone or turning the tracker LED light on remotely, but some features (like the AR tracking) are only on mobile.

The setup process requires little more than scanning the QR code on the back of the tracker (on the web you enter a text code). Then create a profile for your pet with all the usual info, including breed (as mixed or pure, but you can only pick one breed type). The mobile app also has an info-gathering quiz that asks you questions about your dog, seemingly without end, but it just feels like market research.

One account can track multiple Tractive units. One of the better features here is that you can share info on each unit with others so they can also track your pet. That person will have to download the app and set up their own Tractive account, but then everyone can have access to the same information without sharing an account. That's useful for sending to a dog sitter, for example.

Unlike other dog GPS trackers that use either a base station or your home Wi-Fi router to create a safe zone—the area in which your dog is considered at home and safe—with Tractive you create the safe zone in the app and let the GPS satellites and local towers keep track if your pet gets out.

Most trackers provide only a circular safe zone; Tractive provides circles and rectangles. That's nice, but it pales in comparison with the Whistle 3, which allows customized geofences to suit any four-cornered quadrilateral yard. Annoyingly, I couldn't consistently set a shaped safe zone on the web interface that would also show in the mobile apps—I set a rectangle on the web and a circle on the app, and neither overrode the other. The granular size control over a safe zone that other devices/apps provide is also missing—with a 164-foot minimum radius, the zones are quite big if you have a small yard.

Alerts when a pet goes out of the safe zone only come as push notifications on a smartphone—there is no SMS option, and email options can only be reached via the web interface. Premium subscribers can also see the altitude of the device from sea level, a miles-per-hour rating to see how fast it was moving at the last reported position, and a compass for the direction the device is relative to you. The compass is also used for augmented reality (AR) tracking—click the globe icon marked 3D and the camera displays an overlay of the distance to your pet in relation to your position.

Once your pet is out of the safe zone, you can start active tracking with a click of the LIVE button. That checks its position every few seconds. It also eats up battery quickly, so it turns off automatically after 15 minutes (there's a countdown timer bar to let you know when this will happen). That gets annoying to restart if your pet is on the escape, but it's all about battery trade-offs; Tractive says the unit would be dead in eight hours if it was in live tracking mode at all times. Otherwise battery life is quite good. I found the Tractive lasted about five days without much active tracking. The more you leave home, the faster the battery dies, naturally.

When you have a report on a pet's activity for the last 24 hours, you can export it to a GPX or KML file. Those are XML formats for storing coordinates and geographic information. They could be used in a program like Google Earth, which is nice for gear heads, but it's far from as user-friendly as storing up Adventures like you can in the app for the Link AKC.

I experienced some lag in testing. The initial notification from the Tractive took two minutes to reach me after a perimeter breach, which is okay but not great. I also experienced some lag in activating the Tractive's built-in light. In my stopwatch tests, the best turnaround time was 11 seconds, which feels like an eternity when your dog is off in the dark.

This underscores how much faster and more accurate devices like the Whistle 3 are, especially when indoors, because they also use Bluetooth and Wi-Fi to assist with location-based services. That's not an option with the Tractive GPS 3G. This is all a known problem that Tractive acknowledges—weather, magnetic fields (like those from electrical transformers), walls, even windows can wreak havoc on GPS signals. Keep that in mind depending on where you live.

Conclusions

The Tractive GPS 3G does the job it must when pets are outside and being actively tracked, and its battery life is close to rivaling that of the Whistle 3. But it doesn't beat out the competition on features, response time to commands from the app is lacking, and I'm not a fan of the proprietary plastic clip. It's a little less expensive than some of our preferred trackers, but doesn't leave us feeling quite as safe. For that reason, the Whistle 3 remains our Editors' Choice.

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About the Author

Eric narrowly averted a career in food service when he began in tech publishing at Ziff-Davis over 20 years ago. He was on the founding staff of Windows Sources, FamilyPC, and Access Internet Magazine (all defunct, and it's not his fault). He's the author of two novels, BETA TEST ("an unusually lighthearted apocalyptic tale"--Publishers' Weekly) an... See Full Bio

Tractive GPS 3G Pet Tracker

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